Кевин Уилсон - Nothing to See Here

“Did you put ice on it?” he asked, and I just made a face.

Carl was holding this giant black bucket.

“What’s that?” I asked, changing the subject, and Bessie shouted, “It’s ice cream!”

“No—” Carl replied, his face so pained, like these feral kids actively caused him real and lasting trauma. “It’s not ice cream. Why would you think it was ice cream?”

“It’s in a big bucket,” Roland offered.

“I kind of promised them that we could have ice cream,” I told him.

“Well, it’s not ice cream. Sorry.”

“What is it then?” I asked.

“It’s stunt gel,” he said. “Remember? What we talked about?”

“Oh,” I said, remembering. “That’s a big bucket.”

“I had to buy it in bulk,” he said. “I have six more buckets, five gallons each, in the garage. So it’d better work.” He pried open the bucket and we all looked inside like it might hold the soul of an ancient king. But it wasn’t exciting. It was just a big bucket of gel. It looked, honestly, like semen. It looked like a big bucket of, I don’t know, drool. The point is, it looked gross. And we were supposed to slather the kids in it.

Carl rubbed a little on his index finger and then clicked open a lighter, the flame nearly an inch high. He held his finger right over the flame, then directly in the flame, for about three seconds. “Nothing,” he said. “It’s good.”

“It smells funny,” Bessie said, holding her nose. It actually smelled kind of like eucalyptus, but it was overpowering, so much so that it seemed unsafe.

“Okay,” Carl said. “So I talked to my buddy, and he said we just apply it directly to their skin—and, yes, he says that it’s safe—and that should do it. And we just reapply it throughout the day, I guess.”

“You guess?” I said. “You don’t know?”

“Well,” he said, “I couldn’t tell him the real reason for why we were getting it, could I? And stuntmen don’t just walk around all day with it on. They do it for a specific scene, a single shot. But, yes, it’s mostly just water and tea tree oil with some scientific stuff added to it. It’s safe, I think.”

“Why are we talking about this?” Bessie asked, slowly backing away from the bucket.

“It’s for you guys,” I said, “to help keep you from catching.” At this point, I didn’t want to say fire around them if I could avoid it. I just called it catching .

“Why can’t we just keep doing the breathing stuff?” she asked.

“This is an extra level of security,” Carl said, and I so badly wanted Carl, that square, to shut up. He wasn’t helping. “It’s kind of a plan B, okay?”

“I don’t want to put that on,” she said.

“What about the fireman stuff?” I asked Carl.

“The Nomex?” he replied. “I’m still waiting for it.”

“Why is it taking so long?” I asked.

“First of all, it’s only been a few days, okay, Lillian? And how easy do you think it is to obtain it? Like, do you think I can just find child sizes of Nomex clothing at Walmart? Like, for tiny firefighters? I’m having to get it altered. It’s complicated. I’m being pushed to my limits in terms of thinking creatively about our situation.”

He looked a little frazzled, actually, his hair not perfectly combed, and so I put up my hands. “Fine,” I said. “I’m sorry. Thank you for all that you’re doing.”

“Thank you,” he replied.

“Okay, kiddos,” I said. “Let’s just try it, okay? It’s like a science experiment. This will be our science lesson for today.”

“You first,” Bessie said.

“Of—of course,” I said, angry at the reversal but acting like I’d already thought of it, “of course I’ll go first.” I looked at Carl, and he blushed a little. Then he dipped his hand into the bucket and took a sharp breath. “Cold,” he grunted. The gel was weird and viscous, and he started to apply it to my bare arm. It was so cold, just so weirdly cold that it kind of felt good. He rubbed up and down my arm, coating it. Then he did the other.

“Do you want to do your legs?” he asked, and I shook my head. “That’s good for me,” I told him. He held up the lighter and flicked the flame back into existence. “Don’t flinch or anything,” he said. “It doesn’t hurt.” He held the flame directly under my arm, and there was this weird moment where I was certain that my skin was burning, that I was on fire, but I just gritted my teeth and realized that, no, I was fine. I wasn’t burning. And even for a few seconds, it felt amazing, like nothing could ever hurt me. Was this what the children felt when they were burning? I had no idea, but I wished it would last forever.

Once Carl turned off the lighter, I looked at the kids, showing them that I was fine. “See, it’s awesome. God, it’s really neat. And it’s cooling. It feels good in this hot weather.”

Roland put out his arms. “It’s like slime,” he said, excited. “It’s so gross.”

Carl kind of grinned, just a little, and then dipped his hands into the bucket. He did Roland, and I did Bessie, their arms and legs. “It’s so cold!” Roland shouted. When we were finished, we stared at them, appraising how strange they looked, like a ghost had run right through them and left them traumatized.

“It’s not… it’s not great,” Carl admitted.

“Maybe it’ll dry a little?” I said. “It’ll get a little less… shimmery?”

“I don’t think so,” he said. “But let’s go. Let’s just get it over with.”

Isat in the back of the van with the kids, towels on the upholstery to protect it from the gel, while Carl drove us to the public library. Even though they’d been chattering about getting off the estate, the kids were eerily silent on the drive, like they’d been drugged, their faces pressed against the windows.

When we pulled into the parking lot, Bessie said, “What if they don’t have the book that we want?”

“They’ll have it,” I said.

“Maybe you should go in and check them out for us,” she said, leaning back in her seat.

“That’s fine with me,” Carl said. “Tell me the books that you want, and I’ll get them.”

“No,” I said. “That defeats the whole purpose of coming.”

“I don’t want to go in there,” Bessie said. “Everyone is going to stare at us.”

“No one is going to stare at you, Bessie,” I told her.

“They will. They’ll think we’re weirdos.”

“Honestly, Bessie? People don’t care about anyone but themselves. They don’t notice anything. They are never looking at what’s interesting. They’re always looking at themselves.”

“Are you sure?” she asked.

“I promise,” I told her, hoping that I was right.

“C’mon,” Carl said. “Let’s move.”

We walked into the library, air conditioner humming, not much activity on a weekday morning. The librarian, an old man with thick glasses and a really lovely smile that showed crooked teeth, waved to us. Bessie frowned, suspicious, but Roland said, “Hi!” A few seconds later, we passed an old lady with a stack of books in her arms. “Hi!” Roland said, and she nodded. There was a toddler in the kids’ area with her mother, and Roland said, “Hi!” and the toddler looked confused, but the mother replied with her own greeting.

Carl said, “Roland, you don’t have to say hi to everyone, okay?”

“Don’t make it weird, Carl,” I said. “It’s fine, Roland. Say hi to anyone you want.”

“I will,” Roland said, looking over his shoulder at Carl and making a face.

We walked over to a computer and did a quick search. Carl went with Roland to one section of the library, and Bessie and I walked over to another stack. “I feel funny,” Bessie said. “This stuff feels funny on my skin. I don’t like it.”